This is an art blog based in Europe, primarily Switzerland, but with much about the US and elsewhere. With the changes in blogging and social media, it is now a more public storage for articles connected to discussions occurring primarily on facebook and the like.
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God bless Jerry Saltz, for calling it out when being interviewed by Irving Sandler for The Brooklyn Rail:
"The same sixteen curators assemble all the shows all over the world,
showing the same sixteen artists. It’s horrible and frustrating. If
you’re not on the circuit you can’t get in the circuit. That’s bad. I
see a lot of mid-career artists who have done something for years get
passed over for a much younger artist doing essentially the same thing. I
see younger artists getting passed over simply because another curator
hasn’t given them the stamp of approval."

"People who have real theoretical minds read widely, they read selectively and they read for use."

Robert Storr: Most theory has little bearing on art:The critic and
curator speaks to The Art Newspaper, and article by Helen Stoilas.

Robert Storr, US critic, curator and dean of the Yale School of Art, is
visiting Frieze Art Fair for the first time, to take part in "Scenes
from a Marriage: Have Art and Theory Drifted Apart?", a panel discussion
today at 12pm with artist Barbara Bloom and philosophy professor Simon
Critchley. He spoke to The Art Newspaper about the role of art theory,
and what advice he is giving to his students in today's artistic
climate.

The Art Newspaper: The topic of the Frieze panel is "Have Art and Theory Drifted Apart?" What are your thoughts?

Robert Storr: I'm not sure that art and theory
were ever that close to begin with. There are some artists who read
theory seriously but not all that many. And some of the theoretical
writing that was done about artists was very important, but what people
now call theory is a vast field and a relatively small amount of it
bears directly on art, or at least on art production.

Mr. Storr makes some poignant points in this interview beyond
discussion of the relevance of art theory to art practice. Perhaps, for
the working artist, theory is always a work in progress, integral with
vision. The eye is nothing without the brain, and questions are almost
always more interesting than the dogma of answers. Storr's comments
about youth and late bloomers are of particular relevance in cities like
Chicago, where most artists will work an entire career with little or
no critical or market acclaim. Ten such Chicago artists will participate
in a one day only studio exhibition on Nov. 8. See details at
www.brucethorn.com/news/

Tony Isabella, a renowned comic professional, does book and comic reviews on the website World Famous Comics. Here is a great, short and sweet one of a startling book.

"After listening to one of the authors on "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart," I requested The State of Jones: The Small Southern County That Seceded from the Confederacy by Sally Jenkins and John Stauffer [Doubleday;
$27.50] from my library. The book is a fascinating and frequently
horrifying account of the outnumbered, under-supplied Mississippi
unionists defying the wealthy slave-owners who launched the American
civil war to preserve their lavish lifestyles and their "right" to
enslave other human beings. It's also the story of the heroic,
remarkable Newton Knight and his two families, one white, one black.

This is a page turner, though the chronicles of brutality (on both sides
of the conflict) and atrocities (more on the Confederate side) often
forced me away from the book. At least when I was in school - and that
was before and not long after the Civil Rights Act became law - our
history books glossed over the darkest parts of this story. I never knew
the Confederate leaders plundered the families of the poor soldiers
pressed into fighting for a cause not their own or that those
Southerners who sided with the Union were subjected to even worse
treatment. I never knew that the racism of Andrew Johnson and the
weariness of Ulysses S. Grant allowed these same Confederate monsters to
reclaim their power shortly after the war and continue subjugating the
poor. Sadly, the reality of the common man blindly following leaders who
constantly act against his best interests is all too familiar to me. I
see its like whenever the ignorant scream their Faux News talking points
at "tea parties" and town hall meetings.

If I were a history teacher, The State of Jones would be required
reading for my students. It's an exceptional work of non-fiction and, as
such, it earns the full five Tonys."

Steve Durland was famous many years ago for his wonderful and often
biting postcards from God, which were just that, sent to many artworld
people. He also served as Managing Editor of High Performance
magazine from 1983 through 1985, became editor-in-chief in 1986 and
remained in that position until the magazine folded in 1997. In 1994 High Performance won the Alternative Press Award for coverage of cultural issues. Linda Frye Burnham and Durland co-edited the book The Citizen Artist: 20 Years of art in the Public Arena,
an anthology of 20 years of High Performance magazine that was
published by Critical Press in 1998. In 1995 Linda Frye Burnham and he
co-founded and currently co-direct Art in the Public Interest, an arts nonprofit that is currently producing the Community Arts Network.

On his website, he has a very amusing Art Buzzword Bingo. The directions:
Print out and take this bingo card with you to your next arts
conference. Mark off the buzzwords as you hear them; the BINGO square is
a free square. If you get five in a row (up, down, diagonally), stand
up and shout "Bingo!" as loud as you can. You've won!

Go here
for the card! (The page dynamically draws a new Bingo! card when
loaded. You must enable you browser's JavaScript feature to see the
card.)

I have yet another idea for a new term I would like to add to the
artworld discourse. After CC (Consensus Correct), PoPoMo, Pintophobia,
Feeble Painting and the others, I now suggest "Art Circus Fleas."
This is a term for all those perennial members of every huge artworld
spectaclist event: Maurizio Cattelan, Ugo Rondinone, Rirkrit Tiravanija,
Wolfgang Tillmanns, etc. etc. etc. The top o' the pops "every show's
gotta have em," well-trained purveyors of cute ideas for trendy
consumption. The artworld's equivalent of a minor sideshow attraction
asking for great attention. Feel free to add names of your choosing to
the list of Art Circus Fleas!

Tom and Pauline of BALCONYTV.COM interview Little Steven (Van Zandt),
the American musician, songwriter, arranger, record producer, actor, and
radio disc jockey, who is best known as a member of Bruce Springsteen's
E Street Band and his smash hit radio and podcast program The
Underground Garage. They discuss his record label Wicked Cool Records,
his program, the crisis of craft in music and the future of Rock.

Love to read the irrascible Matthew Collings on art, but don't get an English newspaper, hate Modern Painters
magazine (as you well should) and don't get English TV? Well, now you
can read his "PUT DOWNS & SUCK UPS: MATTHEW COLLINGS' WEEKLY
VENTINGS ABOUT THE ARTWORLD" articles on Saatchi online. Don't know who
he is? Get to know him. Matthew Collings is an artist and writer who
lives in London. He studied painting at the Byam Shaw School in the
1970s and at Goldsmith's in the early 1990s. He has written several
books including 'Blimey!' and 'This Is Modern Art'. He has written and
presented many TV programs, including the series, 'This Is Modern Art,'
which received several awards including a BAFTA. His most recent series,
'This Is Civilisation,' was on Channel 4 in November 2007. A book to
accompany the series has been published by 21. Collaborative paintings
by Matthew Collings and Emma Biggs can be seen at the Fine Art Society,
London